How to Operate the Animal Powered Nursery (The Anti-Fragile Nursery Flywheel) - Part 3
So, you’ve already tried to grow plants from seeds for your garden.
You probably had success, but it felt bitter. You enjoyed the work with the earth and the seeds, but the work itself was monotonous, slow, dirty, somewhat anxiety-building, and tiring. It looked like it was more about dealing with setbacks than doing something. It was not your fault: you just lacked a nursery system that sets the stage for successful seed propagation.
The solution is to create a nursery flywheel that builds a solid base for any garden project (small hobby or large and ambitious), which compounds forces with the natural world (we can power the nursery with animals and/or composting piles) and makes the task easier each time.
In the last letter, we explained that the minimal viable nursery takes 10m2 of footprint to sustain 1000m2 of garden beds.
Now it is time to learn how to operate it.
In this edition, in 9,6 minutes or less:
#1 Animal versions
#2 Without-animal (compost pile) version
#3 Seed Propagation
Animal versions
Animal husbandry is the pinnacle of agriculture. It is a more difficult task than systems with only plants, but the production potential is much bigger.
Moreover, the forest is incomplete without animals.
A designed nursery like ours considers the animal in its wholeness, integrating its needs with its outputs, which makes the work lighter for us.
Chickens
Chickens live best in groups between 4 and 20 individuals, becoming stressed and having fights inside the group outside this range.
I would recommend not going below 4 and not above 20 for each rooster for these reasons. Downsizing the animal housing for the chicken from the original design is not advised, then.
The minimum size for 4 chickens is:
- Coop (inside): 8–12 sq ft (0.8–1.2 m2)
- Run (outside): 32–40 sq ft (3–3.7 m2)
- Total: 40-52 sq ft (3.8-4.8 m2)
In our plan, the Coop and Run are nested inside one another, and you should place the Coop aboveground in a “second story” and maybe create another story to expand the Run space. You have to give them enough material to scratch in this situation.
You can place the Run outside the nursery, if you have the space for it, allowing you to decrease the nursery’s footprint itself. Our design will continue to work perfectly, because the chickens come back at night to the coop to sleep, heating the nursery at night.
I reckon that if you live in cold climates, you will have to plan more than anybody else, because you will have to make sure the chickens are safe in winter.
Another consideration is that at both the beginning and end of planting season, the temperature during the day is still too cold, so, in order to maintain the needed temperature inside the nursery, it must be insulated properly and the chickens’ job of heating the space is crucial for the seed propagation success. You’ll probably have to plan your nursery with the Coop and Run nested either way, even if you plan to let them loose outside, since you will have to shelter them during winter.
Tropics and dry climates may be easier to plan. Nevertheless, predator pressure may be a bigger problem. You have to identify the chicken predators in your area and build the nursery accordingly. Create the habit of checking the security structures daily.
Operation is straightforward, because you only need to feed them and provide enough material for them to scratch, which, if you have a lot of excess herbs, kitchen scraps, and seeded straw, serves both as feed and scratch material. You may need to supplement them with feed to achieve their daily intake requirements (depends on the breed and season). It is perfectly feasible to just feed them with kitchen scraps, and herbs if you can gather enough (you can plant parts of your garden for chicken food and plan a scavenging strategy with local restaurants), especially if you can let them scratch outside and forage — chickens and orchards are a great combo, because the chickens eat the fallen fruits and the insects in them (it is a theme for a future letter).
Gather the eggs daily, control their water, and check if the coop is in good condition. From time to time, you will have to clean the floor and gather the bedding with their droppings, which are an amazing material for composting—the designed use for it.
For the layout, make sure of:
- Nesting boxes
- Perches aboveground
- Good ventilation
- Shade
- Predator proofing
- Dry floor with enough bedding to soak up their droppings
- Dust bath
- Fencing
Consider carefully the chicken breed suitable for your climate and plan. Bantam chickens are smaller, very smart, independent, and don’t eat plants when the plants are already bigger, which allows you to let them run in your garden beds.
Guinea Pigs
As said before, guinea pigs are a more friendly option for you, if noise and space are issues.
They are a true zone 1 animal, while chickens are a zone 1/2 or zone 2 animal.
You can keep a minimum of 5 animals, with 1 male and 4 females. In our original plan of 3.25m2 dedicated to them, you can keep 10 adults, with 2 males and the rest females. That includes space for the babies, (if you plan to breed them) but you may have to expand the space, by creating a second story if they breed too many babies—and the extra space will be good for the adults.
They are browsers and eat grass, herbs, fruits, and kitchen scraps. You can keep them in the pen or even let them out to browse.
They reproduce quickly, with the females giving birth 3-5 times per year to 2-4 babies per litter. In 4-6 months, the babies can already be slaughtered for meat, so you can raise 12-60 new guinea pig adults per year with this setup for meat.
The pen for 10 adults and babies includes:
- Walls: 40–50 cm (16–20") high
- Total area: 3–4 m² (approx. 32–43 ft²)—include “upper story” to use the space more efficiently
- Feeding area
- Water point
- Clean bedding
- Hiding spots
- Nesting spots
The idea is to practice animal husbandry and produce meat for consumption, while collecting rich droppings for composting and heating the nursery. Of course, you can keep adult animals without eating them, while gaining the other benefits.
Guinea pigs need protection from extreme cold and extreme heat. Below 15°C (59°F) and above 28°C (82°F) they are at risk of dying. Their ideal condition is 18–24°C (65–75°F). Since the idea of the nursery is to create a microclimate for our seedlings, this temperature range is already contemplated, but you have to remember to insulate or provide ventilation and shade by planning your structure correctly.
You take care of them by feeding them, checking their pen, changing their bedding rich in manure, and harvesting them for meat.
Without-animal (compost pile) version
Soil creation is our first priority—always.
The end result of all the chain of events that happen in the natural world is fertile earth. Composting is a process for soil production, and it is much easier for us to manage than raising animals.
A composting pile is the ultimate hack because of its simplicity and the depth of impact.
Follow our 18-day fast composting (Part 1 of this series) to know how to make a compost pile and power the nursery.
In a future letter, we will explain hotbeds. They are long-duration (3-4 months) compost piles that are used as heating elements for the growing medium placed above them. There are debates about who invented this technique, but it seems that the ancient Egyptians discovered it, from whom the Romans learned. They then applied it extensively, spreading the practice throughout their territory.
If you choose this option, you just have to keep making compost piles to heat your nursery, which will probably produce more soil than you need, which is a positive side effect.
The important thing is to plan how to source enough material.
Longer-duration composting pile recipes, like hotbeds, are a good option to spare work. You can start the season with a fast compost to heat the nursery up and get the raw material to produce a seed-starting mix and fertilize your beds, switching to a longer-duration recipe afterward.
In this option, sourcing or scavenging material is the job that gives the most work.
Seed Propagation
This design relies on not holding on to the seedlings for too long.
We plant them early and rely on good-quality compost. We also practice multi-sowing, that is, germinating more than one seed in each cell or block (more on multi-sowing in a future letter). Use either Charles Dowding-style trays or soil blocking.
It all starts with good-quality seed-starting mix, which you produced from the compost you made, as explained in Part 1 of this series.
After you have it, just fill up the trays with it. Overfill them with compost, because it settles down later and may end up being not enough. Place the desired seeds in each cell, and sprinkle a little earth on top and water thoroughly with a fine hose shower. The earth must stay humid without any accumulation of water. Check daily and water when necessary. You may need to water twice a day, more or less.
For the seeds to germinate, they only need constant warmth day and night, and a soil with appropriate texture, good humidity retention, and good drainage.
After they sprout, they need full light, which, if you place them in the nursery, is provided by the sun. No artificial light required.
Depending on the plant, they can go into the ground in 2-4 weeks. If you delay transferring them to the beds, the good seed-starting mix gives you a little room to maneuver.
Soil blocking functions the same, but they may lose humidity faster, so you have to keep a closer look. You can produce the blocks with a soil-blocking machine or by hand, shaping the seed-starting mix like clay—it will require more patience, but it works perfectly well.
A Charles Dowding tray with 60 cells uses only about 2 L of compost. Soil blocks of the same size (3 cm or 1.2 inches): about the same.
Last but not least, you have to plan your planting calendar for your location (hardiness zone), frost-free days (remember that the nursery’s job is exactly to expand the growing season, or the frost-free days), your own taste, and how much food you want. Since you have compost, your soil will have more fertility, and you can plan succession planting, which is planting another crop just after you have harvested the old one.
A garden bed flywheel will be the subject of a future letter, but we already talked about a cog in the flywheel in a previous letter about how to Turn a Patch of Grass into a Vegetable Bed Instantly - Sustainably and Without Backbreaking Work.
Pen and paper are essential tools here.
Remember that this is a flywheel, and for it to work right, you have to place all the cogs in place.
I have tried to explain the principles for a fun and successful experience, but remember that the ultimate teacher is your own experience, and you may need to “mod” the design and flywheel for your situation and preferences.
It is “open-source.”
Another warning: don’t let your preferences become a liability.
Follow Bill Mollison's tip: “A design (or flywheel) is not correct if you produce work or waste. Producing work means that the necessity of an element of the system (like the chickens) is not being supplied by the system. Producing waste means that a product from an element of the system is not being used (like chicken droppings).” Iterate based on that.
Our next step is the garden bed flywheel, so that the seedlings can grow and produce yield.
